Now Is Not The Time
by Iknowyoulovemexoxo
Summary: When every single part of your life feels like it is scheduled to the last second now is really not the right time for Paul to get injured, not in Stephanie's eyes anyway


This is entirely the fault of **Jade** so hopefully you all enjoy it.

* * *

It was a regular Friday for Stephanie working in the office, well regular apart from the fact that her husband was halfway around the world wrestling and she was at home with the girls.

It was just before lunchtime when her secretary appeared in her doorway, "Crown Jewel is on soon, do you want me to hold all of your calls when Paul's match is on so you can watch it in peace?"

Laughing softly she did love how well she knew her but this was one event she wasn't going to have on in the background, she didn't know why but she wasn't, she would watch it later with the girls. "No thank you, I won't be watching right now but thank you for the offer."

Normally she would have the show on in the background whilst she worked and when her husband was wrestling she would stop working for the most part and watch him because even before their relationship started officially him wrestling was a big part of their relationship and she couldn't break the habit of watching all of his matches even if she was meant to be working.

As her secretary shut the door behind her she couldn't help the feel of dread in the pit of her stomach. Trying to put all bad thoughts to the back of her mind she focussed entirely on her work.

* * *

Paul had been excited for Crown Jewel, not so much now with the controversy surrounding the event but there was still a small amount of excitement in his stomach knowing that for the first time in longer than he cared to remember he was going to be wrestling with his best friend and 'road wife' by his side. Every time he called Shawn his road wife he was sure that he was one step closer to being murdered judging by the look that he gave him but it was all his wife's fault and he was happily going to throw her under the bus before he got killed himself. Just thinking about his wife made him smile, they hadn't been apart long and they were going to be apart a lot longer as he was going straight from Saudi Arabia to Manchester, England ready for Raw on Monday and then there was Smackdown and maybe then he was going to get to go home to his family.

"Ready Hunt? The smile on your face says you are on another planet and not right here."

Hitting his best friend over the head with the glow stick laying on the table beside him he playfully included a glare. "Shut up road wife. I was thinking of my actual wife, I can't wait for the match to be over with so that I can call her."

Playfully gagging Shawn grabbed his glows ticks and walked closer to the door so that there was a fair distance between them. "Can you two not be so cutesy? We have ass to kick and you need to be in Game mode."

There was no problem with him getting in to Game mode and soon he had an intense stare on his face, "Let's go and kick a Mayor and a Deadman's ass."

* * *

Everything was going well, the crowd was loving Shawn being back and it felt like they hadn't missed a beat but as he was on the outside of the ring and the announce table got cleared off . . . wait, he wasn't clearing the announce table of the monitors before he picked him up? Shit, this was not going to end well. There was nothing that he could do but allow himself to be picked up and slammed down and hope and pray for the best but as soon as he came down on the monitor he knew something was wrong as the was a sharp pain across his chest and shoulder, rolling to his side he clutched it tightly and prayed the pain would pass.

As he lay on his side on the floor he was examined by the ringside Doctor all he could think of was the amount of work in his diary and how he couldn't afford to be out of action as there was no way he could ask his wife to pick up the slack at all for him.

Despite medical advice to the contrary he got up and finished the match, he had no strength in his arm and he was in agony but these people paid to see DX so he was going to give them the best version of DX his body would let him.

Walking backstage with Shawn he had his arm close to his body and he supported it with his other arm keeping his head low desperately avoiding the looks from people wondering how bad it was, he just needed to call his wife and let her know that he was okay because if she was watching, which she normally was, she would be worried sick and he would prefer not to be in the dog house right now.

Breaking away from Shawn he went in the direction of his locker room but was stopped by two large hands on his shoulders, "Where are you going?"

"My locker room? I'll get myself checked out in a minute but I have something I need to do." Unfortunately they didn't let go of his shoulders and turned him around steering him towards the trainer's room, "Would it kill you to listen to me for once in your life?"

* * *

For the next few hours she was immersed entirely in her work, that was until her cell phone began to ring ripping her from the world she was in back to reality, staring at the screen on her phone filled her with dread, there was no good reason that the WWE Doctor would be calling her. "Chris?" Strangely there was a lot of background noise but as she listened a little closer she could make out the sound of her husband's voice but not what he was actually saying, "What has he done?"

"He is being annoying and obstructive so can I leave him in your capable hands please?" He wouldn't normally call the wife to calm his patient down but when it involved his boss he would prefer to pass the buck than get fired because his boss was injured and mad.

Annoying and obstructive? Those two words summed up her husband well sometimes. "Of course, pass the phone to him please."

"Thank you." Walking the few steps over to the bed where his patient was currently arguing with his best friend and his match opponents he squeezed in among the group, "Phone for you Paul."

Reluctantly taking the phone he put it to his ear, "Hello?"

"What am I hearing about you causing trouble?"

He didn't know how, why or where he managed to get his wife on the phone but right now he was thankful to him, it wouldn't last once he got off the phone though. "Can I have some privacy please?" When nobody moved he started glaring at them, "GET . OUT" Waiting until he was alone he turned the phone to speakerphone to make it easier for him to hold a conversation. "I just wanted them to let me get my phone so that I could call you, I wanted you to know that I am okay but nobody would let me go and get my phone."

"What do you mean you wanted to let me know that you're okay? Why would I think otherwise?" Now she was worried, very very worried and she was starting to think of what she was going to have to arrange so that she could fly out somewhere.

"Did you watch Crown Jewel?"

"No, I had a bad feeling and I chose to work and not watch it. Why? What happened? How badly are you hurt?"

It was even worse that she hadn't watched the show, at least then she would have been prepared for the phone call but now he imagined she was pacing back and forth in her office. "I'm not . . . that hurt, it is just a potential torn pectoral muscle because I got slammed on to the announce table with the monitors still on top."

Her husband was right with his thinking, as soon as he asked if she had watched Crown Jewel she was out of her seat and pacing up and down her office. "I told you that wrestling more than just at Mania was a stupid idea, you have so much shit on your plate that you can't afford to take time out to have an operation and to rehab." She didn't even really mean the WWE, she meant their family too because their family time was stretched thin and now he would be pulled in yet another direction that he really couldn't afford to go in.

"I know baby but you know your Dad, he wants to make these shows as big as possible and apparently Triple H is hot shit. I'm sorry though, this is the last thing that I wanted. There is some good news to this though, maybe, I am flying back from here to Alabama, well technically I'm flying home for like a day and then I will fly out on Sunday to go to Alabama to be assessed and to have the surgery immediately so I won't be away until Wednesday anymore."

He could try and spin it however he wanted but he was still in the dog house and she still didn't appreciate it. "If I were you I would not go there because now I have to call the Nanny and tell her not to let the girls watch the match until I get home and I get to explain to them how Daddy is injured and may have to have surgery, thanks for that Paul." Tired and frustrated she just ended the call, she couldn't go round in circles with him right now.

When the screen to the phone popped up that the call had ended he sighed heavily, it was no accident but he was definitely in deep shit with her. Gently collapsing back on the bed he groaned and stared at the ceiling, he hated his life. As the door opened and Shawn stuck his head inside the room to see if it was safe for them to come in again Paul threw his good arm over his eyes to block them out, "Just leave me alone, Steph is pissed and I now have to go home and face her before I find out how bad my injury is."

Pushing the door open to actually come in and to let everybody else in Shawn had to bite his lip so that he didn't laugh, that woman was a McMahon through and through, how his best friend hadn't worked that out yet was a mystery. "You sir are stupid. Why did you even tell her that you were actually injured? It is much easier to tell the woman nothing and just appear home injured so then you get sympathy and they don't spend the time it takes you to get home brooding about the injury."

"Fuck off Shawn."

* * *

Seventeen hours later and finally Paul was getting out of the cab just a few feet from his front door. Much to his surprise the front door didn't open at the sound of a car in the drive and neither could he see any of their faces in the front window, oh great, he was still in the dog house. Struggling to the door with his bag in hand he was about to put his key in the door when his eldest opened it, "Hi Daddy."

"Hello gorgeous. Where's your Mom?" Grateful for a friendly face he knew that it may only go downhill from there.

"She said that if you want to be stupid enough to get yourself injured then you can open the door all by yourself but I knew you'd struggle so I came to help you."

Dumping his bag at the bottom of the stairs he turned and pressed a kiss to the top of her head, "Thank you baby, I appreciate the warm welcome from you. What are your sisters up to?"

Taking her Dad's good hand she was very careful of the arm in a sling, "They're watching a movie. They already got told off once so I don't think they wanted to disobey Mom as she threatened to ground them if they didn't do as they were told."

Oh shit, this didn't sound good. "Uh oh, at least I have one good daughter today. Come on though, let's go and see your sisters." As they walked in to the lounge he made his way around the couch bending down to kiss his wife on the lips but he was greeted by her cheek instead, "How are things Steph? Are you ready for Monday?"

"Am I ready for Monday? Not really, I thought that everything was all set in place, the girls care was all taken care of and now I have to think about your care too because instead of working you're here."

Not wanting to argue right now in front of the girls he dropped it moving to kiss his youngest two before he took a seat on the couch between his wife and the girls to watch the remainder of the movie with them before he spent quality time with them.

* * *

When the movie ended and the girls got up from the couch their two dogs decided that they would wake up from their naps and choose to be excited by their Father's early arrival home, how he managed to survive that without swearing when Attila bumped his arm was a mystery but he was grateful for his self control in that moment.

The guilt he felt as Vaughn tugged on his good arm and asked him to play Pictionary with her and he had to say no was immense; normally he would fight through the pain but not today, not right now.

Slipping out of the room as Vaughn tried to get Aurora to play with her he went to retrieve the painkillers from his bag before he went to grab a bottle of water from the kitchen. As he walked in to the room he noticed Stephanie getting things out of the fridge, "Whatcha doing?"

"Sorting dinner out for the girls."

Wow, she wasn't even looking at him and giving him short, sharp responses. Just when he needed the support of his wife the most she was figuratively the furthest away from him that she had ever been. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Sure, I could use some help cutting up these carrots . . . oh wait, you can't cut anything up so the answer is no." She knew that she shouldn't be mad and snarky with him but she couldn't help herself, she couldn't believe that he would do this to her.

"I'm sorry okay Steph? The last thing I wanted was to get injured but shit happens okay? It wasn't my fault and it isn't something that I could prevent so maybe don't take it out on me."

"Just fuck off. I am going to have enough problems with the dogs under my feet without having to deal with you too."

He opened the fridge and got out a bottle of water before he did as she asked and left the room.

* * *

The evening was difficult and the atmosphere was frosty which made things with the girls hard as it was obvious that they picked up on it because they played up so when it was time to put them in the bath before bed it wasn't a moment too soon for Stephanie.

Once they had all had a bath and were in their pyjamas ready for bed she opened her mouth to tell them it was time for them to actually get in to bed but before she could Murphy had flopped on to the couch beside her Dad causing the pain to shoot through his arm as the cushion bounced beneath her weight. "Daaaaaaaaaad, will you read to me tonight please?"

"Yeah, me too."

At this point she didn't care that the girls wanted their Dad because it meant that she could escape and blow off some steam. "Well if you all want your Dad to read to you and put you to bed I will say goodnight and work out." Going across each of her daughters she pressed a kiss to the top of their head and wished them sweet dreams before she left the room to get changed.

As he was in charge of bedtime Paul motioned for his daughters to come closer to him. "Please be careful of my right arm but I would really like to have my daughters close for a cuddle before you all go to bed. Sometimes even parents need a lot of loving from their children."

As she was the oldest Aurora took charge and instructed her sisters to go to their Dad's good side and she took a seat on his bad side but carefully lay down and rested her head in his lap looking up at him, "Love you Daddy."

"Love you too Princess, all of you." Thankfully it was Saturday night so the extra fifteen minutes that he allowed them to stay up wouldn't matter in the grand scheme of things but after fifteen minutes he knew time was up. "Alright, time for bed you lot. Watch as you get up please Aurora."

Aurora went one better than sitting up and being careful, she rolled off the couch landing on her knees on the floor, "See Daddy, I'm good."

Joining his youngest two daughters he laughed at his eldest's actions. "Alright alright smarty pants. Get up now and let's go to bed." He reached his free hand towards her and helped her stand up before they all headed upstairs.

* * *

After changing in to her gym gear Stephanie had made her way down to the gym. As it was pretty clear that Paul wasn't going to be putting the girls to bed any time soon she turned the music on and allowed herself the opportunity to fall apart letting all of the tears that she had been holding back flow out as she slid to the floor.

When she found out that her husband was injured she was in work and couldn't be seen to be falling apart as that would just be too much office gossip for her to handle right now and then she had come home jumping straight in to taking care of the girls, understandably they were all upset by it so she had to be strong. She hadn't even managed to find the space to cry when they went to bed as all evening and night she had been interrupted by the girls as they were all unsettled.

Once she had let all of the tears out she wiped her face and stood up to actually get a workout in, hopefully it would make her feel better about herself once she had.

* * *

He put the girls to bed and then crawled in to bed, he wasn't tired as such but he was simply drained from the injury and being one handed but also the not actually fighting fighting that was going on between Stephanie and him.

* * *

When Stephanie had finished her workout she went upstairs to check on the girls before she jumped in the shower, as she walked straight in to the en-suite without walking in to the room she failed to see her husband sat in bed. After her shower she wrapped a towel around herself to go and find something to wear to bed but as she opened the laundry basket to dump her gym clothes in she notices the shirt that her husband had been wearing, sure it probably smelt but it would give her the comfort of having him close so dropping her towel she pulled on his shirt before she left the bathroom to just go to bed, well maybe after she went to say goodnight to Paul.

Upon exiting the bathroom she heard movement from the bed, making a quick check that it wasn't one of the girls she saw that it was her husband. Walking closer to him she paused at the bottom of the bed just watching him, the nasty bruise was becoming quite prominent on his arm and chest and all she wanted to do was make it better.

Paul knew that his wife was there because he could sense her presence but he refused to lift his head to look at her only for her to snap at him so keeping his focus entirely on his phone he continued, with difficulty, to type out instructions for Matt Bloom and Shawn with regards to NXT, he wasn't planning on being out of action for long but he wanted the next week covered to be on the safe side. It became harder to type out the instructions when his wife picked up his only good arm, he was about to say something in complaint when she slid beneath it and placed it down around her shoulders, women were weird.

The tension in the room could be cut with a knife and she knew that what she had just done had confused him but seeing him sat there brought it all home and she just wanted to be close to him and to never let him go. "I'm sorry."

"You're . . . sorry? I'm confused."

Being ever so careful of his bad arm she held on to his waist as best she could. "I'm sorry for snapping at you and hanging up yesterday, I'm sorry for being short and distant with you since you got home. The thing is that I'm not mad at you; I'm just scared because every injury scares me. What if that was your last match? What if you can't do your job because you're right handed? The girls need you, **I** need you and can't bear the thought of losing you and every operation always comes with a risk of the person never waking up again, what if that were you?"

The relief that he felt hearing her apologise was immense, he didn't think that he could get through Monday without her love and support, he **needed** her. "It's fine; whatever I don't really care to be honest." He wanted so badly to wrap both arms around her and hold her tightly. "If I can't wrestle then so be it, if I lose my arm completely I am sure that your Dad will find a way for me to keep my job, that old man is a stubborn mule and if he sets his mind on something it is happening so if he thinks I'm doing a good job his mind will be focussed on me continuing it. None of it matters if I don't have you and the girls. My focus is on my family, fuck everything else. I need you to help me get through Monday, I can't do it without you, there I said it. I know that I won't lose my arm but it doesn't mean I'm not scared."

"Me too, I always am when you're injured. This whole thing doesn't help that it is going down when I'm in Lisbon. Did you have to get injured right now?"

Paul grumbled at the reminder. "Did you have to remind me about that? How am I meant to survive the operation without you? What about the girls? How much do I tell them? How much do I let them see? Can't you skip the conference and deal with it all for me please?"

Wrapping her leg over his she rested her head on his chest. "Tomorrow. There is time before my flight, and hopefully yours too, to arrange the finer details but right now I just want to hold you tight and never let you go."

"I'm okay with that. If only your hugs were as physically healing as they are mentally but I can survive, I have you by my side."

Carefully playing with the fingers of his bad arm she tried to relax but ultimately she knew that it was a futile attempt because she was going to get very little sleep that night as she panicked about everything, the next night because she had to take a red eye to Lisbon, Portugal for a conference on Tuesday and then Monday night most of the night would be spent going between calls with Paul and the girls because the girls didn't understand what he was saying to them and they were too scared to ask him because they were scared that he wouldn't be okay.

* * *

Stephanie didn't even know how she managed to focus and take part in the conference on Tuesday as at that very moment her husband was going under the knife.

Whilst she was on stage she tasked her assistant with keeping an eye on her phone, as soon as she was off stage she made her way back to her in the quickest but politest way possible so that she could retrieve her phone. "Any news?"

"Nothing yet."

"Thanks." She wasn't even looking at her as she replied as she was going through her contacts to find the number that she had saved the night before so that she could get in contact with the Nurses desk to see if there was news whilst her assistant started uploading a couple of pictures for her to be able to post them to Instagram.

The amount of tweets that she had asking her how Paul was had blown her mind so she added on the end of her post about what she had been doing that she was heading home to take care of her man should hopefully satisfy their curiosity and also amuse her husband when people freaked out because he had a weird sense of humour and enjoyed looking at it.

Straight from the conference it was back to the hotel to change in to something a little more comfortable for flying and to check out of the hotel before they went to the airport to get back to America.

* * *

Paul was under the illusion that she was going to stay at home with the girls and do her work from the office as normal as he would be home in a couple of days but she couldn't and wouldn't do that so she had already organised her flight to Alabama from New York a couple of hours after she landed.

It was the middle of the night when she arrived at the hospital, she probably should have booked in to a hotel but she hadn't thought that far ahead so she would ask nicely and hopefully get an hour's sleep in his hospital room.

Practically tiptoeing down the corridor she didn't want to wake any of the patients. Placing her bag on the floor as she reached the nurse's station she could tell that she was about to politely be told to fuck off and come back tomorrow so now it was time to grovel. "I know it is the middle of the night but I have been in Portugal since Sunday." Well technically she had, "My husband had a consultation on Monday and surgery today, or well yesterday. I don't know, I have literally just landed and it was a last minute decision to come here rather than wait at home for him so I don't have a hotel room so I was hoping that you would be generous and would let me nap in a chair in his room please? I miss him, I'm worried about him, I just want to be near to him please."

It was hard to deny a request like that so the nurse nodded her head. "Sure. If he wakes up and wants something just come and find someone."

"Of course." After being directed to her husband's room and finally setting eyes on him for the first time since Sunday she wanted to cry, between the lack of sleep and the relief at actually seeing him again it was all too much for her heart.

Making sure that her bag was out of the way so that nobody would trip over it she took a seat to text his parents to let them know where she was so that they could tell the girls as she had drafted them in to stay with the girls whilst she was away because Paul wasn't working in England as planned, he was in hospital. Not feeling overly sleepy she did a little scrolling through twitter even going as far as to make one post when she heard her name being whispered. Raising her head to look at the bed she was so happy to see Paul staring back at her, well maybe not at this hour. "What are you doing up? You should be sleeping and resting."

"I'm thirsty. Why aren't you home?"

She took it as her duty to take care of him so got up to get his drink for him. "Strangely enough I couldn't stay home for a few days not having seen you or been here for the operation. Your parents are with the girls and you said that you'll be going home in a few days so it will be fine."

He took the drink from her taking a long drink to soothe his dry and sore throat. "And the meeting that you have set up for tomorrow? I'm sure your Dad didn't okay you missing it."

"I may or may not have told him to go and fuck himself when he tried to guilt me in to being there but people will understand because most people have a heart."

"Except your Dad."

She laughed and instinctively slapped his arm but instantly regretted it as it was his arm but then she realised that it was his good arm so she was safe. "I never said that."

"No but you thought it and I don't blame you." He was tired and in pain but ragging on Vince was making him feel better although he was done with that now. "I am so glad that you came, I missed you."

"I missed you too." Placing the glass back on the side she took his hand playing with his fingers. "I was so scared about being apart from you when you had the operation and I felt so guilty about it that I am relieved to be here now."

She shouldn't be feeling guilty; she did nothing to feel guilty about. Okay, so she wasn't there in person when he had the actual operation but she was on the other end of the phone and judging by what the Nurses and his parents had said she was always either checking up on him or reassuring the girls so she couldn't have had much rest herself and the bags under her eyes supported that theory. Carefully shuffling nearer the edge of the bed he patted the small space beside him, "Come and lay with me. Sometimes a man just needs his wife and right now this man really needs his wife."

"I want to Paul, I really do, I just don't want to get in trouble."

"I don't care. It is really early in the morning so they're not going to want to check me over so why not? It's either that or a sexy Nurse's outfit for when we get home."

Not in the mood to argue with him because she was way too tired for that she slipped off her shoes and climbed on to the bed beside him being careful of the tube in his hand, shuffling down a little she lay down and rested her head on his chest listening to his heart beneath her head. "Who is to say that I haven't bought a sexy Nurse's outfit and you will get the enjoyment of that if you are a very good boy?"

Yawning tiredly he pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "I don't care either way, I am just happy to have you back in my arms."

Tomorrow the hard work began but right now he didn't need to worry about hard work, he didn't need to worry about anything at all because his wife was back by his side


End file.
